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The 2020 Oxfordshire Festival in late May will be showcasing quite a few treats, if all goes smoothly considering Covid-19.

Unsung highlights include:

22 May - World premiere of Elgar's Spanish Lady Comedy Overture

First modern performance of Frederick Hyman Cowen's Symphony No. 4, discussed here:http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,7544.msg79238.html#msg79238

23 May - World premiere of Edgar Bainton's Variations and Fugue in B minor

More info here: https://www.englishmusicfestival.org.uk/2020-oxfordshire-festival/programme.php

Yes, just bought my seat to attend the performance next year. Should be an interesting experience to see if it can capture the same magic a large orchestra can.

Unfortunately the performance has been canceled due to Covid-19. There hasn't been any plans for this to be rescheduled or streamed online.

Thought it might be worth noting that the second movement, "Volkslied" (Folk song), takes an extended musical quotation from the Swedish tune "Ack, Värmeland du sköna."

Also, Hamerik's five Nordic suites were his most popular compositions until his seventh symphony was written in 1898.

Found this rare recording of an American radio broadcast put on by the "Society for Forgotten Music." It includes various American works by composers which even in 1950 were already figures of the distant past. Hope you find it interesting.

https://www.wnyc.org/story/concert-by-the-society-for-forgotten-music-quartet/

Works:

String Quartet No. 2 Op. 132 by Henry Hadley

Piano Sonata in E Major by Alexander Reinagle

I Have a Silent Sorrow Here by Alexander Reinagle

My Days Have Been So Wondrous Free by Francis Hopkinson

Come Fair Rosina by Francis Hopkinson

O'er The Hills by Francis Hopkinson

To Helen by Charles Martin Loeffler, words by Edgar Allan Poe

"Mona's Dream" by Horatio Parker from the opera "Mona"

Quartet by George Whitefield Chadwick

With thousands of CDs, how on earth would I find the time to rip them? I'll continue to buy them until they aren't made any more and then switch to downloads. Simples...

Well if you do some for a few hours every weekend Alan, you may be done in as little as 50 years. 

As Mark said, if the booklet has useful info that can be continually referenced, such as a libretto, it is a nice item. But many downloads offer digital files of the liner notes anyway.

Since CDs can be ripped onto a computer, if one plans to listen on a CD player, in addition to a portable device, then it is still the best value.

I only ever listen to digital files which I purchase, unless the classical piece is on a decent sounding vinyl (analog quality has its advantages). Having all of one's music on a publicly shared server kind of devalues the meaning of a "collection," in my opinion. Yes, you can categorize what you like, but I think there's a difference between adding a song to a cart and adding a song to a playlist.

Great minds think alike, or something to that effect!

I've heard the one in the link. It is by a high school orchestra in California, and while you can tell it is unpolished, you have to give them credit for tackling such an unsung work.

Mine would have to be Glière's third symphony, Ilya Muromets. There is so much to unpack that it requires multiple listens to barely get your head around it. The orchestration is luxurious and is one of those monumental symphonies that should be played more often in concert halls requiring a powerful piece.

However, Raff's 7th Symphony would be a close second, so I completely understand FBerwald!

I'm surprised the first Swiss performance of this piece was just in the past few years. Many Russians were expats in Switzerland around this time (including Scriabin), so I am not sure why this monumental work was neglected for so long!

I just posted an improved recording of Koessler's piece. Any unusual sounds you hear are from the original broadcast.

Evidently the Tapiola Sinfonietta concerts take place in Espoo, in southern Finland. Could make rather an interesting trip...

Yes, just bought my seat to attend the performance next year. Should be an interesting experience to see if it can capture the same magic a large orchestra can.

Obituary in German can be found here: https://www.br-klassik.de/aktuell/news-kritik/werner-andreas-albert-dirigent-gestorben-nachruf-100.html

Especially grateful to him for all of his radio performances of Nicodé's works.

Isn't it possibly the case that our introduction to the symphony was a performance in which slower tempi were adopted so we have got used to that

If the roles were reversed, where Herrmann was faithful to the markings and Järvi was much slower, some may have said that he ruined it by being too "sluggish." I agree with Kevin that it is preferable, but it certainly isn't "awful" in my opinion. As Mark has said, the music keeps up and it doesn't lose its effectiveness. That helps demonstrate just how skilled Raff was as an orchestrator.

This is a very melancholy piece written by the American composer George Templeton Strong, who by the time he wrote this piece in 1916, was already living in Switzerland.

On the score of the piece, he prefaces it by stating:

"I dreamt of a dismal landscape. Seated on a roadside, at the edge of a forest, I saw a hearse approach,
followed by a few people. When this procession had passed, I felt more alone than ever: it seemed that I had
lost some one who was dear to me, and I was afraid."

Unfortunately there is serious background noise from this recording from 1978, but I am not sure if it distracts from the beauty of the piece. I am curious as to your opinions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9ndJeKufPc

It is certainly more enchanting in the second movement, from what I hear in the sample.

Do you think it is likely that it will be available for digital download?